Karen Langley reports that the once-a-day Pennsylvanian between Pittsburgh and Harrisburg will receive state funding after all:
The Corbett administration says it reached an agreement Thursday with Amtrak that will preserve daily rail service between Pittsburgh and Harrisburg by reducing the cost to state government.
Under the revised agreement with Amtrak, the agency would maintain the Pennsylvanian, with one train a day in each direction between Pittsburgh and Harrisburg. The line serves stations including Greensburg, Johnstown, Altoona, Huntingdon and Lewistown and continues through to Philadelphia and New York City.
The deal with the federal rail agency reduces a state contribution that was scheduled to rise in October to $6.5 million annually. Instead, the state will be required to pay $3.8 million annually for the line, according to the administration.
Unfortunately expanding the service frequency to multiple trips per day doesn’t seem to be on the immediate agenda. Rail is a better mode than air travel for this short of a distance, and we need a serious commitment from Harrisburg to giving people real options besides relatively slow cars and buses for traveling between PA’s major metros.
The statistics in the attached article are interesting. However, in many cases the cities are quite close (such as Milwaukee-Chicago), which would make flying unlikely–probably most would drive (there are only 3 flights a day). KC-St. Louis doesn’t really have much intrastate business traffic (the cities feel like they are in different states sometimes).
The article is right though–when it comes to high-demand corridors between relatively close, densely populated cities, a good rail system can drastically reduce the demand for uneconomical short-haul flights. The Germans do this quite well by linking their rail system to Frankfurt airport (the rail system’s hub), which means that you “fly” Frankfurt to Cologne on a train–all with an integrated Lufthansa ticket.
I don’t see much demand to fly from Harrisburg to Pittsburgh, though.
Air is probably the wrong comparison; there isn’t much in the way of intrastate air service, and what there is, is mostly super-expensive. People who fly today will probably never take the train, because they’re willing to trade a lot of money for time.
Meanwhile, a smidge to the south, the Pennsylvania Turnpike sits as the only serious road connection between southwest and southeast, and here train travel shines; it’s fully cost-competitive. Turnpike tolls Pittsburgh-Valley Forge are $20.62, and the 300 miles of driving between Downtown Pittsburgh and Center City Philadelphia, at 25mpg (average) and $3.50/gallon gasoline (laughably cheap) will set you back $40, for a total of $62 incremental costs (not including mechanical wear). The Pennsylvanian, meanwhile, is $54 at the bottom bucket, $84 at the top bucket. Time is the other dimension; Amtrak does what I would call “just good enough” at 7:25, versus 4:40 on the Turnpike, assuming no traffic whatsoever, and no stops, neither of which are realistic. I for one would gladly make that tradeoff, since I can’t read or work while driving.
But of course, you’re never going to pull people away from the Turnpike with only one available departure per day, and departing Pittsburgh at 7:30a at that. More frequencies would almost certainly be cheaper per train to run; run enough, and Pennsylvania might find itself in Virginia’s position. All of Virginia’s state-supported routes turn a profit.